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Yearly Archives: 2022

Keep trying but, I don’t scare that easy.

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The lights are on,

but the drive’s not there.

I wonder if this happens to everyone?

I’m sure it does, except

I’m not everyone.

And you, you’re part of them but lately

only half as strong.

Does that sound correct?

Or am I just scratching an itch

not meant to be scratched?

Am I bucketing a well

when all that’s left is rain?

I hear you when you say you’re tired.

I’m tired too.

And when you say you’re trying, love

I’m trying too.

I feel you when you’re breaking,

partly because I’m breaking too.

I feel it when your heart is aching,

since mine’s been split in two.

What’s left than but a couple lines?

Enough to prove our sorrow?

For all the many times I’ve died

I’ve always seen tomorrow.

It’s hardest when you say

the words that help you sleep,

so sleep as many days

as it took for me to wake.

Besides, I feel much better since

I know this fight’s a gas,

it’s a wonky handle left we clutch

of a longing meant to last.

So Easy

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There’s nothing wrong with me.

There’s nothing wrong with you.

You asked me once what I don’t like

and I thought that was cruel.

Imagining that someone once

had made a list for you.

It breaks my heart and darling that is something I’d never do.

See I might have my flaws,

and you might have yours too

But in your eyes I see a light that shines on through and through.

Is this what they told us love could be?

Cause you make it all

so easy.

It feels like how twilight reflects onto snow.

It feels like I’m finally ready to go home.

I knew it when I saw you

wear that crimson dress.

With converse on and your hair down

I nearly lost my breath.

Is this what they told us love could be?

Cause you make it all

so easy.

The Perks of You

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As daylight wanes, and night begins

there’s rapture in the air.

With static thought, and moonlit eyes

I see it all too clear.

What’s written in the stars, is written in the sand.

What’s written on the heart, is written now by hand.

My love for you is twilight.

My love for you is snow.

My love for you is many things, my love for you is old.

I’ve kept it in the shadows, of poetry and light.

I’ve kept it in the darkness, to brighten up my night.

Just know my heart is dancing, like fire unto stone.

Just know my heart is breaking, each night I am alone.

As daylight comes, I feel you near—

the darkness goes away.

The perks of you are endless still, your love’s a weathervane.

Four Walls And Myself.

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Head in palm I sit defeated.

It’s not out of necessity

but choice, I think how come?

In a world of opportunity, what’s left of me but this?

Tangled in my heartache, what’s left for me but this?

Fist to chin I sit and wait,

for thought to turn to word, to pen.

Has writing any of this down, ever made me any sense?

Has stewing in this endless grief, ever made me any cents?

It’s times like this I dare not move.

I dare not speak but listen,

to the winds which wrap my innocence

in a shroud of Turin—distant.

What’s left of me but gall?

The daylight helps me see,

somewhere within this shell of me

is darkness and that’s all.

I wish I had the answer, the one you claim to see.

I wish I had your courage, your courage to believe.

This wooden desk is cold.

My heart is growing old.

I’d rhyme a couple lines or two, if younger were my skin.

Settling I feel, my insides wearing thin.

What’s left of me but this?

What’s left for me is everything I fear to touch with reason.

What’s left of me’s so tangled in the ever changing seasons.

With arms crossed round my chest, I sit in awful doubt.

It’s here I know the meaning, of four walls and myself.

It’s here I risk repeating, a fate which is not mine.

It’s here I hope I’m worthy still, of love which I’ve denied.

A Leap Of Faith.

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Things start to break when you let people in.

Ever notice that?

It starts out small with a glass or a plate,

maybe a phone charger, then a window.

Plans with friends start to teeter.

Promises become obligations.

Without you knowing, things start to change.

Long before the heart does, the brain does.

Smiles become madness, answers become questions.

Who am I without you here?

Where do you go when I can’t follow?

Are you happier without me, or do you just need you?

I wish I didn’t have to know all this, but I do.

I do what I do and I know what I don’t.

I’m a god damn fool.

It’s optional though, when things start to break.

You don’t have to be stupid or choose to be cruel.

What you need to do is let the right ones in

and let the wrong ones know

there was never anything wrong with them at all.

It’s a leap of faith.

It’s a faith I’ve had in many,

though now I see and understand

it’s a leap within myself I need to take.

It’s the pieces I’ve kept together I need to break.

Paranoia

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These days of paranoia.

I’ve done it to myself.

The skin around my finger’s tight and raw.

My front tooth’s chipped and my back’s out of place.

I black out for my own protection.

Everyone’s concern, I’d rather soon forget.

Everyone understands until I mention it.

Will you bring me back home

to that place I left but never left?

Is the only reason I escaped

to remember until death?

A slippery slope?

No,

it’s just one I haven’t leapt.

I know I should be smarter, but

I’m an adult now, and

I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to anymore.

Besides, I’m a sucker for punishment.

A slave to myself.

I’d be a liar if I said I didn’t need it to survive.

I’d be stupid if I didn’t admit that this has all just been a long winded good bye.

How strong are we?

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We’re a very resilient bunch.

And we don’t give ourselves enough credit.

We give ourselves hell, and worry half to death.

We sweat, and stir, and think ourselves depressed.

We apologize for feeling in fear we’re being judged.

We’d rather bury our shame than see ourselves alive.

I know because I have,

and it’s a mean bitch to break.

It’s a cheerful judge and jury

who know nothing of our sorrow,

who predict us by our sin

and relish in our fate.

That other voice inside ourselves would rather condemn us for our failures

than see us for how far we’ve come.

Our life’s a disappearing act that’s always on display.

We struggle, fight, without respite until our dying day.

Nothing’s ever good enough.

No one is here to stay.

Would it kill you to feel at peace, in the presence of yourself?

Would it kill you to feel at home, in the love of someone else?

Not everyone’s out to get you, but some I’m afraid are.

Your private life’s not meant to be the butt of someone’s joke.

It’s when I whisper to myself, I feel most sincere.

While everyone is sleeping Lord it’s then I shed a tear.

It’s enough to drown my sorrow, enough to drown myself.

I’d give up everything you know to become someone else.

But even that is false I know in fact my heart regardless breaks,

for all the fattened silly saps who refuse to embrace,

this love we harness willing, this love we share in doubt,

this love we try to hide behind in fear we’d love ourselves.

It’s hard now to be honest when I’ve only half the plot,

still I know that I’m trying even when it seems I’m not.

You see, if we were a system

or a code that one could break,

this life would be unbearable, a pre-determined fate.

It’s why feeling lost is common.

It’s why letting go is hard.

It’s why seeing our own reflection feels like staring in the dark.

It’s why a single day seems agonizing.

And years just skip likes stones.

It’s while thoughtless in the afternoon

I feel I’m getting old—

except for children passing

one falls and scrapes his knee,

he cries and cries

then like the sun, he rises and forgets—

It’s then that I’m reminded, how old I felt at 9

and all the weight I carried, was really never mine.

What often gets me’s this, how quickly we forget.

How strong are we?

We’re strong as fuck,

resilient until death.

Observational Therapy

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“It’s a hip place, I guess?

I should have worn hipper clothes.

That’s the trouble when your wife dresses you!”

This is what the English Lit professor says to the guy behind him

who I can tell he imagines is judging him thoroughly for his attire—his words are, “I’m kind of a square.”

I know he’s an English Lit professor because he’s said it loud enough for homeless in NOHO to take note.

“You got your style and I got mine,” says the guy in leather boots, leather jacket, torn jeans, and stringy jet black hair, clearly perturbed.

I don’t want to notice any of this but I do.

Nor do I want to pay attention to the overly dramatic yet cynically pretentious English Lit professor’s attempt to make small talk with the regulars—but I do.

He points out all the quirky nuances that make this place great,

like the hand scribbled signs, one that tells you To Take Phone Calls Outside! And another that states This Is Not Studio City!

He gets a real kick out of those while he fakes making a phone call.

I can’t blame him though, he probably doesn’t get out much.

Eventually the English Lit professor gets his oat milk latte and goes.

The guy in leather does the same, only looks a little more defeated than when he entered.

It’s then this overly polite weirdo-nerd asks me for my seat so he can plug his computer in to charge while he does everything but do work on said computer.

I know this because after I say no, a chair opens up next to me and he does just that.

Except when I tell him no, he turns confused, and I feel like an asshole.

It’s then I realize I’m supposed to ignore my surroundings and get back to my book like everyone else seems to be doing—

page 38’s a doozy.

The boy doesn’t want to tell his father his step-mother raped his recently deceased brother—but he does.

We bring it on ourselves, I guess.

Judgement, I mean.

That’s the problem with cynical, shamelessly self-involved squares—

we can smell our own.

I just consider it observational therapy.

A Very Mean Spirit (I Let Breathe)

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There’s a very mean spirit

buried just beneath the surface,

clawing to be let out, aching to be set free.

He shares my name.

He wears my face.

His voice is mine but far more hoarse.

He comes out on occasion

though only uninvited,

like storm clouds on a sunny day.

There’s a very mean spirit

whom I know better than myself,

who’s skin crawls too

with memories made of me.

His laughter’s contagious.

His effort’s sincere.

The longer walks I take alone,

the easier it is to hear.

And I hate that cackling laughter.

The one I make when I forget.

It’s the one that helps me tell the difference

between his presence and my own.

It’s the reason why I’m jumpy.

And the reason why sudden noises bother me.

His ghost hangs like a bloody cross

dripping on my head

who taunts me when I’m happy,

tickling at my skin,

with all the things I never said.

There’s a very mean spirit

who lies to me, who is me.

We created one another

and his burden is my own.

I don’t dare set him free.

I know better than that now.

And I’ve learned just how to listen.

His cry is golden as the sun

that dips beneath the lakeside

and warms my evening eyes

with rain as sweet as summer.

His cry is mine and mine is his,

but I don’t bury him anymore—

in fact, I let him breathe.

I let him breathe and breathe regardless.

Let The Dog Run Free

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Now comes the time of alternate opinions,

alternate thoughts and alternate feelings.

The kind you don’t dare say out loud.

I wonder how much pain it’ll take to stop?

I wonder how much love is too much?

I wonder how many nights are lost because—

When biting your nails to the bone seems useless

then what else is there, really but to stop.

Or else keep biting, bone can’t be that hard can it?

Still I’d rather draw the blinds or go outside.

Hell I’d rather lay down and die than live a lie.

You see, these things we don’t dare say out loud,

reserved for private evenings

start to find us in our daytime logic,

prying to be let out like a mangled dog.

And won’t we wear our self destruction like a choker.

Like a badge of honor.

Like a cruel

cold

chain—of events.

Won’t we kneel and pray before we give our due.

Won’t we commit ourselves to countless acts of excruciating

self-reliance just to know we did it alone.

It’s that feeling of being so good that it feels you’re no good at all.

That feeling of having tried so hard, for so long,

against so many odds, such awful scrutiny

and then being told I told you so,

like all your effort was for not—but it was.

Now comes the time of alternate opinions,

where everybody told you so, where everybody seems to know.

Now comes the time of alternate thoughts,

where nothing seems right, where everything feels wrong.

Now comes the time of alternate feelings,

where maybe you jumped the gun, but who am I to say?

I put the barrel to my temple a long time ago.

And let the dog run free.

We speak a different language,

I know that you do too—

It’s the kind they don’t dare speak out loud.

It’s the kind they put us down for.